How Grand!

Well, we actually termed it our "sufferfest", but we managed to tag the top of the Grand Teton at 13,770 feet!!!! Jeremy, me, & our dads (60, 69yrs old) headed on up Garnet Canyon (*see below) hoping for the best, even after every ranger we talked to said the route up to the summit was covered with ice in spots.

Sunrise on the peaks on the way into the park

Waiting at 7am to get our permit

Jenny Lake in the stillness of the morning


The famous range

*Garnet canyon. You can see the Lower Saddle at 11,600ft and the summit 7038 vertical feet above the trailhead!

Gearing up! Who wants to carry the large cams? Paper, rocks, scissors?

Starting at the valley floor (6732 ft.)

Coming out of the woods and into Garnet Canyon (notice the dad's trying to drop us).

Mastering massive boulder fields, tougher with these "monkeys" on our backs!

Documented rest stop above Spalding Falls and Petzoldt Caves

We encountered intermittent rain showers on our 6.5 hour hike up to camp in the moraine just below the lower saddle, arriving just before dark.

Our camp at the Moraine (~10,700 ft) with the Lower Saddle in the background.

In the morning we were glad to claim a "rest day" that involved filtering lots of water for meals & our summit day, hiking 45 mins up to the Lower Saddle (11,600 ft) to check out the route to the upper saddle pictured behind us, & get to bed early for a 3am start.

After some helpful tips from a nearby guide & our awesome leader Jeremy, we managed to crawl through the "chockstone", thread through the "Eye of the Needle (pic above)", tip toe around the "Belly Roll-Almost" and then proceed "easily through the path of least resistance" (according to the guide book...yeah right!!) to the upper saddle (pic below: 13,160 ft) about 7am.

Then the real climbing started. After donning our harnesses & roping up we confidently mastered the "Belly Roll" & "Crawl" (pic above) with super huge exposure & even made it past the crux of the Double Chimney! WAY TO GO DADs!!!!



Next was the Owen Chimney (Jeremy leading pic above), which we heard most about, being possibly treacherous with ice/verglass...but we climbed up without much difficulty; just had to be cautious with your hand holds and foot placements.

Yeah!!! We MADE it!!!

We scrambled our way up to the summit with a watchful eye on the weather.


It's official!!!


Hope I'm able to do this when I am 69.

Just "follow the path of least resistance." The Enclosure is the peak below us where Jodi went in 2005 due to inclement weather.

Sargent's Chimney rappel.

The final rappel down to the Upper Saddle was 120 ft & included a "free" part, dangling just in the open air.

We maintained our focus & carefully found our way (usually on all five's) down to the lower saddle & back to camp around 7pm.

The Black Dike (inverted V) was a good goal coming up & getting down

The fixed rope section we used to get up to & down from the Lower Saddle

We were TOTALLY blessed managing to escape the forecasted thunderstorms, with a minute or 2 of graupel & a slight sprinkle once we arrived back at camp...despite some pretty scary looking clouds along the way. After a quick minute to lay down, we packed up camp & headed towards the car just after 8pm. The trail seemed unending & in a trance and sleepwalk-like state we arrived at the car ~2:30am...a full 24 hour day for sure. Luckily we had hotel reservations and crashed.

Upon waking after 11am we enjoyed a fabulous breakfast & dessert (leave it to Jeremy to order triple berry pie AND chocolate cake!) at The Bunnery in Jackson Hole prior to heading home.

Woo hooo! We made it!!!! And less than 12 hours later we began discussions of our next mountain adventure...a winter ascent of the highest point in MN? ;)